Introducing Lindsey’s Daily Deal

By Lindsey Campbell, Captains of Industry

Hey Captains’ Table readers,

Lindsey here. For a while now I’ve been writing The Daily Deal for my fellow captains. It’s basically a low down on the latest news in renewable energy, marketing, social media, and really anything that we might need to know about this forever-changing, forever-growing industry we work in: marketing. And we figured that if we’re in the know, you should be in the know, too. So as of today, we’ll be publishing the Daily Deal on our The Captains’ Table Blog. Happy reading, and feel free to send it to your fellow captains as well.

Over and out,

Captain Lindsey

Here’s your Daily Deal:

1. You Should Care About School Lunches, Even If You Didn’t Pop Out a Kid.

Remember the days of hot lunch? You’d get an ice cream scooper of buttery rice, a carton of whole milk, maybe a piece of pizza or some chicken nuggets, and one of those prepackaged fudgey brownies with the nuts on top. Did anyone else make the cardboard holder the brownie came in into an airplane and fling it at people? No? This is probably why I spent the majority of my recesses in timeout.

But today it seems everyone is on a quest to make school lunches healthier. Even people without kids are on a mission to pop an apple into kids’ lunches rather than a brownie. Why? Well, according to Tom Philpott of Grist, the eating habits we develop as kids largely determine the food choices we make as adults. Meaning, the adults of today are still happily chowing down on junk food more often than healthy food choices based on the food habits they learned as kids. Read more about how citizens with or without kids can help to “put public weight behind the ongoing grassroots effort to create an ecologically sustainable, socially just, and ecologically sound food system.”

2. Meteorologists Vs. Climatologists

In a recent New York Times article by Leslie Kaufman, it seems most meteorologists are skeptical about global warming, where climatologists feel that global warming is very evident reality. In fact, according to the article, there was a study done recently by researchers at George Mason University and the University of Texas that found that “only half of the 571 television weathercasters [surveyed] believed that global warming was occurring” and less than a third believed climate change was “caused mostly by human activities.”

To find out how groups, such as the National Environmental Education Foundation, plan on closing the divide between climate scientists and meteorologists, read Kauffman’s article.

3. No One Cares About Your Product. They Care What Other People Think About Your Product.

Sage Lewis from ClickZ went to Inclusive Media’s SES a couple of weeks ago and didn’t think anything of David Meerman Scott’s statement, “No one cares about your products” until she went to New York in search of some really kick ass pizza. When searching Google for the best pizza in New York, Sage came across John’s Pizzeria. It had 234 reviews and almost all of them claimed John’s had the best pizza in New York City. Of course Sage went and feasted on delicious pizza and maybe a beer or two. The next year, they found another Google recommended pizza joint, and again were pleasantly surprised by just how delectable a pizza pie can be in New York. But when Sage asked her friend Greg if he went on the restaurant’s website, he said he did, but “accidentally clicked on some Flash thing and so he just backed out and went to Google to find more information.”

The lesson is that people might go to your website, and they might even like it, but they still know they’re reading slick copy from some adman (or woman) who are trying to sell something. People will never really trust marketers until we open the conversation and start being straight up with people about who we are and what we’re selling. At the end of the day, are you going to trust what 234 people say about a restaurant or are you going to believe a snazzy website? Check out the post and learn more about Sage’s New York adventure and thoughts on off-site optimization.

4. The Best of the Best.

Are you bored with the blogs you’ve been reading about social media? Check out the top blogs based on quality and frequency of posts, and blog ranking from Vesta Digital:

• Chris Brogan: The Elvis of social media and the king of common sense, Chris Brogan is in a league of his own.
• Social Media Explorer: Social media all-star Jason Falls provides a fresh and interesting take on all things social media.
• Mashable: The world’s source for social media news, Mashable is the place to go for breaking stories.
• Convince & Convert: Jay Baer provides rich content for businesses seeking to embrace social media.
• Altitude: Amber Naslund offers a breadth of fresh air with smart, inspiring and personal social media insight.
• CopyBlogger: The king of engaging content, Brian Clark and his team help businesses persuade in a 2.0 world.
• Brand Builder: For businesses looking to dive deep into social media discussion, check out Olivier Blanchard’s rich insights.
• Diva Marketing: Toby Bloomberg’s blog provides a wide array of social media advice.
• Future Buzz: A nice mix of stories and reviews makes Adam Singer’s site one that should be on your radar.

5. If You’re Going to Lose Your Wallet, Make Sure You Have a Baby, or at Least a Dog.

A group of psychologists in Edinburgh, Scotland wanted to know how many people would return a wallet if personal pictures were inside. Out of the 240 wallets planted, 42% were returned, and of those, 88% of wallets had baby photos and 54% had dog photos.

What the heck does this have to do with anything?

Well, according to Jeanne Bliss of MarketingProfs, it has to do with being human and knowing your customers and their lives. Marketers need to keep figuring out ways to elicit an emotional reaction from customers, like looking at a baby’s photo.

To find out ways to get to know your customers, check out the post from MarketingProfs.